


Analgesia

by orphan_account



Series: House Rarepairs [1]
Category: House M.D.
Genre: Angst, F/M, Greg House Being an Asshole, Huntington's Disease, Hurt No Comfort, Non-Explicit Sex, Season 7 Episode 18 The Dig, Sex Addiction, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships, discussions of euthanasia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-05
Updated: 2019-12-05
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:00:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21676399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Set in Season 7, Episode 18. Thirteen just got out of jail, and House hasn't changed a bit.
Relationships: Remy "Thirteen" Hadley/Greg House
Series: House Rarepairs [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1582174
Kudos: 9





	Analgesia

Six months of jail time. Six months of knowing that when her release day came, Thirteen would call House to come pick her up.

She'd been right that she could rely on him to do that. She'd been wrong about his motives. Six months: clearly enough time for her to forget who House really is. She should have figured that he came out of curiosity, not kindness. 

He's an asshole. She may be fond of him, but to deny that first fundamental fact about him would be to cross the thin line between stupid and delusional. In weaker moments she likes to believe that they're maybe even friends, although she'd never tell him that. Besides, the very notion is ridiculous; friends don't behave like House does. Friends don't seize every opportunity to remind you that you're dying when they find out you have a terminal disease. As far as Thirteen is concerned, friends are supposed to offer you a wild night out on the town and respect your need for privacy when they discover you served a secret jail term. They aren't supposed to drive you to some ridiculous potato shooting contest and demand to know why you got locked up.

Then again, friends don't usually have sex either. They especially don't have sex repeatedly over a number of years, shameless about it, gnawing one another's hands off at the opportunity. And if they do, it should be a thrilling, dirty secret. It shouldn't be the seeming lack of friendship involved in the act that has her sitting at the window in this tacky, twin bedded motel room, wishing she could even begin to consider sleep as evidence of her weakness and bad decisions leaks from her tear ducts.

She shouldn't pity herself. This is House, after all, and if you're dumb enough to shove your hands in his fires, you only have yourself to blame when they scorch you down to the bone. It's just that tonight, she's been even dumber than that: she expected more from him.

Seducing him the first time had been an experiment. She'd gotten curious about how easy it would really be. The man talks about sex constantly, making such thinly veiled propositions to anyone with a vagina that he risks a sexual harassment suit every time he opens his mouth. She half expected him to balk and shut down when she actually suggested it. But she soon came to realise that he would never, could never, say no; House is as addicted to sex as he is to opiates. 

Everyone around him has their own way of enabling his crap. This is hers.

She told herself it was good for both of them. His ego got a big kiss from the knowledge that a hot twenty something would fuck him. In turn, Thirteen felt a perverse sense of security in the realisation that he would never turn her down. Easy food. She never had to engage in exhausting waltzes of seduction, to lean in with suggestive, parted lips, invite with sensuous touches. All it took was a shared glance, a quick lie to the team so they could disappear for a while; off to an empty clinic room, to Thirteen's car, even to one of their apartments after work if it had been a while and they were desperate. Occasionally, she'd feel something close to affection in those moments, especially if their clinical, physical demeanour waned for a second or two, giving way to a grasp of hands, a quick, mutual caress that ceased the moment they realised what they were doing. At times, she was even a little bit disgusted at the sight of him huffing on top of her with his eyes closed and his teeth bared. He was old enough to be her father, after all. 

There were never cuddles afterwards. House never touched her face and told her she was pretty. Thirteen never mused to herself that he was tortured and misunderstood. They didn't kiss. They never talked about it outside of the act. It was a need, a use they had found for one another. When she was reminded of the pleasure her body could receive and give, it was easy for her to forget that she was dying. If sex could do that for her, it must've made House completely oblivious to whatever it was that messed him up so much. 

He's back on Vicodin now. She wonders when that happened. He's a lot better at being numb than she is.

Of course, Thirteen knew they'd end up in bed today. She knew it the moment she walked out of the prison gates and their eyes locked. Just five minutes after checking into the motel they were pressed together on one of the single beds, only half undressed, eager to get it done. House had seemed almost angry, but he did sometimes. He didn't really look at her, and today, it mattered.

It had been good enough. The prison induced dry spell was broken. Still, it niggled at her: it had been a year, after all. A year since they'd seen each other, a year since their... well, whatever this is. Something should have felt different, significant. It should have felt like coming home, being welcomed. It should have felt like... comfort.

That line between stupid and delusional? Thirteen thinks she's crossed it. It's just that she has other needs tonight, needs beyond the physical. Needs she somehow forgot that House can never fulfil. Comfort, that basic human thing, is not in his nature. House is not a basic human. She dares to wonder for a glimmer of a moment if he's purposely feigning such indifference to her turmoil because she refuses to give him the information he seeks. But she can imagine what he'd say to that: “you're pathetic. Stop lying to yourself.”

She doesn't know how long she's been sitting at the window, but it's been long enough that she's sick of listening to herself hiccup and whimper in the dark. Sick of hearing rustling from House's bed, knowing he's awake, listening. Curious, again, perhaps. He wants her to tell him what happened. Not just that she killed a man, but the specifics. Wouldn't he love it? To know that the man whose life she took was her flailing, incontinent, fading brother? 

She debates it for a moment, quite seriously. Telling him everything. Not just the facts, either. She'd add the utter terror she felt at witnessing her future. The premature grief for her life. The realisation that when her disease progresses and she's that far gone herself, nobody will be there to push the plunger and put her out of her misery.

As she hears him sit up in bed, she refuses to turn around, but she purposely gives a loud sob to try to tell him, on some primal, wordless level, what she aches for: _I need you tonight, House. Please, just hold me or something. Get the fuck over here and make it better. Please, for once in your life, show a shred of empathy._

But this is House, and House is incapable.

She isn't sure why she dares to hold on. Hope is a dangerous thing. It extends a hand, then belts you in the face with it. 

Another rustle, a groan from the mattress; then nothing. She's not sure if the snore that follows is fake, but it's long after 3am and the silence outside the motel seems to stretch out for miles. 

Thirteen dries her face on her cardigan as she resigns herself to the company of her taunting mind. It doesn't spare her a thing; the musky smell of the orange jumpsuit that was too big for her. The strength of the mojito she necked minutes after her release, the alcoholic bite like a warm blanket. House mouthing at her shoulder and growling into her neck. Princeton Plainsboro with all its politics and familiar faces; will hers still fit?

Her brother, a breathless mannequin, an act of love.

As Thirteen finally crawls into bed, she considers straddling House and smothering him with his pillow so that she can go back to jail.


End file.
